To get even 10 minutes of access to a major head of state is a gift
that would make thousands of lobbyists giddy with anticipation.

Dr. Andrei Korobkov, MTSU professor of political science, spoke
with Russian President Dmitry Medvedev for two hours at a Nov. 4
state reception and dinner at the Kremlin.

Korobkov encountered Medvedev at the fourth annual Assembly of the
Russian World Foundation, which took place Nov. 2-4 in Moscow.

"The organization is actively supportedbyPresident Medvedev,
who is very interested in pushing it and considers it a way to
reestablish links with the Russian diaspora abroad,"; says
Korobkov. "Increasingly, he is getting interested in bringing
back Russian intellectuals who left.";

Medvedev has poured a great deal of his political capital into the
Skolkovo Project, an attempt at a Russian Silicon Valley north of
Moscow. He has obtained monetary contributions from Microsoft,
Cisco and several Japanese companies.

"Huge amounts of money are being invested there, but for now,
their attempts to bring large numbers of Russian academics are in
vain, basically,"; Korobkov says. "I have been studying
this problem for a long time, so I gave the main presentation at
the conference.";

Korobkov says he emphasized to Medvedev that Russian intellectuals
who have achieved tenure at universities in the West will not be
inclined to return to their home country, especially given the
degree of interaction with the Russian government they would be
expected to endure.

"To imagine that in Russia it would be possible to leave
academics alone is very hard, because it's an extremely
bureaucratized country, and it became more bureaucratized than it
was under the Soviet regime, ironically,"; he says.

The MTSU professor says he suggested to Medvedev that incentives be
provided to lure Russian academics back for short periods so they
could give crash courses to top-flight graduate students and set
them on the path toward becoming the country's new
"brain gain.";

On a personal level, Korobkov says Medvedev operates as a person
accustomed to having power and not shy to show it.

"He is not used to people disagreeing with him,";
Korobkov says. ";And a couple of times he was kind of sharply,
angrily asking me, 'So, what, you disagree with
me?'";

Korobkov also talked politics with Vyacheslav Nikonov, the Russian
World Foundation executive director, who has been a Kremlin insider
for some 20 years and an adviser to both Medvedev and the Russian
prime minister, Vladimir Putin. Nikonov is the grandson of
Vyacheslav Molotov, former Soviet prime minister and then foreign
minister under Joseph Stalin after Stalin assumed the prime
minister's title.

"He is a kind of shadow operator who has access to the
highest echelons of power,"; says Korobkov. ";Nikonov is
very smart, very well-educated, pretty calculating, a typical
political consultant. If you look in the U.S., you can probably
compare him to David Axelrod working for (President Barack) Obama
or Karl Rove working for (President George W.) Bush.";

Before attending the Russian World Federation conference, Korobkov
participated in an Oct. 27-30 gathering in Garmisch-Partenkirchen,
Germany, sponsoredbythe George C. Marshall European Center for
Security Studies.

Members of parliaments, committee chairs, representatives of
international organizations and the European Union, as well as
academics, discussed security and stability in Central Asia and
Mongolia. Korobkov says the countries of this region face great
challenges due to water shortages and governments that are either
openly authoritarian or lean in that direction.

However, some of these countries, which include the former Soviet
republics of Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan and
Kyrgyzstan, are rich in important substances, including plutonium,
platinum, oil and natural gas.

"There is a huge flow of migrants from those countries to
Russia and from Russia to other parts of the world,"; Korobkov
says. "Second, this region is becoming increasingly the
traffic route for drugs from Afghanistan.";

Korobkov says it would be unlikely, however, that these countries
would be invited to join NATO or the European Union as a way of
protecting them from totalitarian takeovers.

"After the Georgian-Russian War, it became very dangerous to
expand NATO because, in NATO, an attack against any member is an
attack against every member,"; he says.

MARKING HISTORY—MTSU professor Andrei Korobkov pauses for a
photo in front of a monument in Germany signed by Soviet soldiers
when they conquered the Nazis.

MTSU's Aerospace Department will serve as host for the first
National Conference on General Aviation Trends in China, set for
Dec. 1-2 in the Donald McDonald Hangar inside the
university's Flight Operations Center at Murfreesboro
Airport.

"We are extremely excited about this conference, as it is
one of the first in the United States that will have members of one
of the largest universities in China here to learn about U.S.
general aviation,"; said Aerospace Chair Wayne Dornan.

"We have a distinguished list of U.S. speakers that will
lend their expertise to the Chinese officials. ... I am unaware of
any such gathering that has taken place in the United States where
high-ranking officials from both countries interact on
aviation.";

The first day's activities will include:

welcoming remarks by Dr. Sidney A. McPhee;

a conference overview from Mike Vaughn, director of
government services for Smyrna-based Corporate Flight
Management;

a discussion of general aviation in the United States,
provided by Craig Spence, vice president for operations and
international affairs for the Aircraft Owners and Pilots
Association;

news about aviation in China from Dr. Sun Xinqiang, vice dean
of the Beihang University Law School;

a panel discussion on general aviation in China and the
United States; and

an update from Dean Fulmer, project manager for the Federal
Aviation Administration's National Special Use Airspace
project manager.

Following lunch, Mark Libby, head of collaborative
decision-making at the FAA's Air Traffic Control System
Command Center, will lead a session on airspace management and air
traffic control. The chief of China's air traffic control
system will then speak on airspace management and traffic control
in that nation, and a discussion of similarities and differences in
air traffic control in the nations will close the session before
the group tours the MTSU ATC labs.

Thursday's morning session will begin with a talk on regional
airline operations in the United States from Charles
"Chuck"; Howell, CEO of Great Lakes Aviation Ltd., and
will be followed by:

a discussion of regional airline development in China, led by
Geng Xue Song, vice president of operations and chief mechanic
for China Flying Dragon Aviation Co. Ltd.;

a review of fixed-base operations and the role of charter
airlines, led by Allen Howell of Corporate Flight
Management;

a manufacturers' panel discussion on general aviation
business trends; and

closing remarks from Beihang University's Sun.

After lunch, the group will tour Smyrna Airport's
aviation facilities, followed by a Corporate Flight
Management-sponsored reception.

The educational disciplines that focus on service to society are
now under one umbrella at MTSU. As part of Dr. Sidney A.
McPhee's Repositioning the University for the Future
Initiative, the new College of Behavioral and Health Sciences is
taking its first steps toward the future.

With the departments of Criminal Justice, Health and Human
Performance, Human Sciences and Psychology leaving the College of
Education, the new college also welcomed the Department of Social
Work from the College of Liberal Arts and the School of Nursing
from the College of Basic and Applied Sciences. In addition, the
Communication Disorders program moved from its affiliation with the
Department of Speech and Theatre to the Department of Health and
Human Performance.

Joining the academic departments are the Centers for Health and
Human Services, Organizational and Human Resource Effectiveness,
and Physical Activity and Health for Youth, as well as the
Tennessee Center for Child Welfare, the Speech, Language and
Hearing Clinic and the Adams Chair of Excellence in Health Care
Services.

"We really see ourselves as a research-powerful operation for
getting grants and other opportunities because of
cross-collaboration between disciplines,"; says Dr. Harold
"Terry"; Whiteside, dean of the new college.

Whiteside views the TCCW, in particular, as a grant-management
operation that will serve other departments, help with paperwork
and identify additional grants.

Dr. Rick Short, associate dean, says the former College of
Education and Behavioral Science understandably gravitated
overwhelmingly toward teacher education. The reorganization not
only provides education with its own point of focus, he says; it
enables the other disciplines that share a common thread to become
part of the same fabric.

Behavioral and Health Sciences' mission statement reads, in
part, that it "coalesces around a student-centered approach
to provide reality-based, direct learning experiences that serve
their graduates as well as future professionals. These experiences
also prepare students to enter competitive graduate programs in
their respective areas of interest and disciplines.";

Whiteside says he takes an egalitarian approach to administration,
and that means the process of fashioning this new college must be
inclusive.

"I didn't come in here to dictate anything to
anybody,"; he says, "so the mission statement is a
collaboration of all of us. The strategic plan is a collaboration
of all of us.";

"The next process for the strategic planning committee
… will be setting up goals and identifying opportunities and
then setting a timeline for that,"; Short adds.

"Typically. strategic planning is on a five-year horizon. So
we'll at least have a sense of where we'll be in five
years or where we'll want to be in five years.";

What does all this mean for students and alumni? As a practical
matter, teaching and learning will continue as usual. Graduates who
wish to make donations may do so for their particular departments
or for the university as a whole. Whiteside says e-mails explaining
the particulars will be sent in the near future.

Lucie Burchfield is the college's point person for
development. To contact her, call 615-898-5032 or send an e-mail to
lpburch@mtsu.edu.

Students in Dr. Catherine Crooks' Psychology 4600 course are
teaming up with Nashville CARES to offer free HIV testing on
Thursday, Dec. 2, in the Keathley University Center from noon to 5
p.m. Participants should meet on the second floor at an information
table just outside the KUC Grill. For more information, visit
http://mtsufreehivtesting.weebly.com.

I am an administrator in the Academic Office of China Agricultural
University in Beijing. I and Ms. Zhanrong Zhong visited MTSU from
March to August 2010 as shadowing researchers to learn how MTSU
committed itself to serve students from Tennessee and beyond.

On Sept. 27, I shared my experience in a two-hour lecture with my
CAU colleagues, chaired by Mr. Wenliang Wu, the provost of CAU.

CAU is a 211 university in China. "211"; is a Chinese
National Educational Project, during which the government will
support the top 100 universities of the 3,000 institutions of
higher education nationwide to help them become the best Chinese
universities in the 21st century.

With Dr. Sidney A. McPhee's initiatives and continuous
efforts, CAU and MTSU have developed strong partnerships in the
areas of student exchanges, visiting scholars and joint research
since 2001. Ms. Zhong and I spent six months at MTSU as the first
group of visiting administrators.

"I wrote a 50-page report on how the best university in
Tennessee offers students a quality education,"; I explained
to my colleagues. "My report covers the university profile,
admission policies, freshman orientation, personalized academic
advising, a robust computer system for teaching and learning, and
universal access to technology.

"The (Student Health, Wellness and) Recreation Center is a
very enjoyable place and a good facility for faculty and students
as well. I enjoyed backward floating very much when I swam after
working long hours in the office.

"My gratitude is great for the hospitality I received from
MTSU, and the days I spent in Murfreesboro will become a valuable
memory for this trip to the United States.";

My colleagues expressed strong interest in how the university
faculty and staff serve students and create a student-centered
learning community. MTSU's efficient practices, robust
administration and a technological system serving more than 25,000
students stirred up the meeting participants' heated
discussion.

MTSU graduate student Wencheng Hu received this article and
photo from Ms. Wang and sent it to the Office of News and Public
Affairs for publication in The Record.

STATUS REPORT—Jianhua Wang, at far right, uses her laptop to
present her report on her visit to MTSU earlier this year with
colleague Zhanrong Zhong. Wang is an administrator in the Academic
Office of China Agricultural University in Beijing, and she and
Zhong shadowed researchers for six months to learn more about
MTSU's "student-centered learning community.";

MTSU officials officials support preliminary discussions by
lawmakers to secure funding for the $126 million proposed science
building by reducing the state's share of the project to less
than $100 million.

Dr. Sidney A. McPhee said he was grateful for the work by
legislators, state officials and others to advance the science
building, which has been on the state's priority list for
higher-education building projects since 1998 and designated as the
No. 1 priority for the last three years. The university's
current science buildings have been deemed outdated and inadequate
to support demand created by MTSU's record-breaking
enrollment.

State Sens. Bill Ketron, R-Murfreesboro, and Jim Tracy,
R-Shelbyville, said at a Rutherford County Chamber of Commerce
legislative luncheon on Nov. 17 that they thought the project would
fare better before the Legislature if the state's cost could
be reduced below the $100 million mark.

McPhee said he will work with the senators, as well as the entire
local legislative delegation and other key lawmakers, on ways to
reduce the state's portion of the cost and move the project
forward. Under such a scenario, he said, the university would
secure the balance needed to finish the building through other
options apart from state funding.

The president also echoed the senators' urgency on moving
quickly with the project to take advantage of lower construction
and material costs. While the project has been scaled back
considerably during the years-long planning process, McPhee said
the university will look for additional ways to reduce costs while
preserving the building's functionality and educational
mission.

TEACHING MORE TEACHERS—Former Hangzhou Normal University
President Lin Zhengfan discusses "The Development and Future
Perspective of Primary-School Teachers in Rural Areas in
China"; with students in the Paul W. Martin Sr. Honors
Building Nov. 9. Dr. Lin and his delegation from MTSU's
Confucius Institute partner school visited MTSU, three Murfreesboro
schools and school systems in east Tennessee during their Nov. 7-14
visit to observe teaching methods in kindergarten through 12th
grades in both city and rural settings. The delegation, which also
included Genzhen Zhen, Jing Zhang and Jianmei Shen, visited the
Discovery School at Reeves Rogers, Siegel Middle School and Siegel
High School in Murfreesboro to observe local teachers in action.
The group concluded their week in Tennessee with a visit to the
Capitol to meet Gov. Phil Bredesen and tour the Tennessee State
Museum and Frist Center, then attended MTSU's 29th annual
Salute to Armed Services events on Nov. 13.

Sometimes a project works so well in the private sector that a
governmental agency decides it's worth copying and
broadening. The MTSU Center for Organizational and Human Resource
Effectiveness is doing the same thing in reverse.

COHRE is taking the Foundational Leadership Academy it created
three years ago to help Rutherford County government employees and
offering it to private businesses and organizations.

The Foundational Leadership Academy conducts five half-day sessions
once a month with county workers who have leadership potential. Up
to 12 trainees and two primary trainers provide individual
attention and cover the issues business leaders constantly
encounter.

Dr. Patrick McCarthy, director of COHRE, says the academy was
designed to be practical, rigorous, hands-on and affordable, is
quite adaptable to private-sector circumstances and is applicable
in both large and small businesses.

"It's still about running a business,"; notes
McCarthy. "It's still about managing people. It's
still about motivating. It's still about dealing with
conflict effectively and constructively.";

Rutherford County Mayor Ernest G. Burgess is a believer. He writes,
"We recognize the value of developing our people, and COHRE
has done a wonderful job adapting the training to the needs of each
individual group. COHRE is a competent, energetic, resourceful and
trustworthy organization.";

"While, on the one hand, we're a stand-alone consulting
firm of sorts, our affiliation with the university means a key part
of our mission is to serve our community,"; McCarthy says.

After three years of proven performance, the time seemed right to
take the Foundational Leadership Academy to the Rutherford County
business community. Dr. Michael Hein, associate director of COHRE,
says many firms are discovering that they need to bolster their
bench strength.

"What's actually happening is the retirement of the
Baby Boomers,"; says Hein, ";and a lot of companies are
realizing they're going to have to move a lot of people up
into positions to replace those people. And they don't have
the skills to do that.";

In the Foundational Leadership Academy, participants tackle
specific scenarios within groups with each individual playing the
roles of observer, feedback provider and feedback receiver at
different times during the exercises. Ultimately, the entire group
will discuss their approaches to the scenarios together.

"We've had one person in the county with several years
of business experience whose comment was that this was the best
training she's ever received,"; Hein says.

COHRE's qualifications are found in its
people—consultants with both peer-reviewed academic expertise
and decades of real-world experience. Some of Hein's former
clients include Toshiba, the Jack Daniel's Distillery, Ingram
Books and the Murfreesboro Police Department. Among
McCarthy's former clients are Proctor and Gamble, Union
Carbide, State Farm, Pearl Drum Corporation and United Way.

To find out more about COHRE and the Foundational Leadership
Academy, go to
www.mtsu.edu/~cohre or call 615-217-2084.

After a six-year hiatus due to stringent U.S. government controls
on travel to Cuba by American citizens, MTSU's Department of
Foreign Languages and Literatures has revived its successful Cuba
study-abroad program for summer 2011.

The new program, called "Project Cuba,"; has been
retooled to fit new laws and is one of only a few such programs in
existence nationwide.

"It's a shame to wait out political changes that might
never come,"; said Dr. Ric Morris, professor of Spanish and
linguistics at MTSU, who is serving as program director.
"There has never been greater urgency for Americans to get
behind the Iron Curtain and see for themselves what Cuba is all
about.";

Because of the trade embargo, visiting Cuba without U.S. government
permission can incur fines in the hundreds of thousands of dollars
and up to 10 years in prison. As a result, very few Americans go
there. The 2011 Cuba program is covered under an academic license,
however, and is 100 percent legal for all qualifying participants.

The program will be open to three classifications of participants:
undergraduate students, graduate students and faculty. All three
groups will depart Nashville together on May 20, 2011, but will
return at different times. Faculty and graduate students will stay
two weeks and return on June 3. Undergraduates will stay 10 weeks
and return on July 31.

"The undergraduate program is longer because U.S. law
requires undergraduate study in Cuba to be at least 10 continuous
weeks, no exceptions,"; Morris explains. "Graduate study
falls under the category of research and is not durationally
restricted.";

While in Cuba, undergraduates will earn nine hours of Spanish
credit taking language classes at the University of Havana. They
also will take a custom-designed course, "Anthropological
History of the Cuban People,"; to be taught in English at the
Montané Anthropological Museum in Havana. On return to MTSU,
the course may be equated to three hours of credit either in ANTH
3710, Special Topics in Anthropology, or GS 3010, Global Studies:
Study Abroad.

Graduate students and faculty will conduct independent-research
projects. As much as possible, they will work in the field with
research assistants, who will also help break down any cultural or
language barriers encountered along the way.

For the duration of the visit, all three groups will reside in
Havana in comfortable guest- house lodging. They will take meals
together and enjoy cultural activities and excursions as a group.

"The only difference will be what each person does during
working hours,"; Morris says "Undergraduates will be
taking classes, while the faculty and grad students are working on
their research.";

All three prongs of the program are open to participants in any
academic field and with any level of Spanish ability.

So why visit Cuba? Morris explains that much of what we hear about
Cuba in the United States today is highly politicized, leading to
grossly inaccurate perceptions of what Cuba is really like.

"We have no excuse for being ignorant about Cuba,"; he
says. "Cuba is closer to our borders than Chattanooga is to
Murfreesboro, but what do we really know about Cuba besides the
fact that it's Marxist and exports cigars? How many Americans
know, for example, that Cuba has virtually eradicated several
lethal diseases that still kill thousands of Americans each
year?";

Morris points out that past trip participants typically come away
deeply challenged by the experience of being in Cuba even for just
a few weeks.

"A lot of what you've believed about Cuba turns out to
be correct, but even more turns out to be wrong,"; he says.

"Cuba is the final frontier,"; Morris adds. "After
graduating college, most Americans will never have the opportunity
to visit Cuba again legally. If Cuba intrigues you, there
won't be a better time to go than now.";

Morris has been to Cuba five times: four as an educational-program
director and once on a humanitarian mission.

For more information about Project Cuba, interested students and
faculty should contact Morris as soon as possible at 615-898-2284
or
rmorris@mtsu.edu.

You also can listen to Morris discuss "Project Cuba"; in
the Nov. 21, 2010, podcast of "MTSU On the Record,";
available anytime at
www.mtsunews.com.

POINTS AND PINTS—American Red Cross Donor Recruitment
Representative Brittany Durham, center, congratulates MTSU
Athletics Director Chris Massaro, left, and Western Kentucky
University AD Ross Bjork Nov. 20 after announcing MTSU's win
in the inaugural weeklong blood-drive contest. MTSU students,
faculty, staff and community supporters donated a total of 551
units of blood Nov. 15-18 during the "Bleed Blue to Beat
WKU"; competition, Durham said, while Western's campus
donated 508 units. "This is so awesome and I am so happy for
you all,"; Durham said in a congratulatory campuswide e-mail.
"What a successful first year at doing this!"; The
blood-drive results were announced during the first quarter of the
MTSU-WKU football game in Bowling Green, which the Blue Raiders won
27-26. The competition will become an annual event before each MTSU
and Western football game, organizers said.

The Learning, Teaching and Innovative Technologies Center at MTSU
has just finished a fall 2010 First Tuesday Series that educated
teachers on problem-based learning, an approach that encourages
students to seek answers to real-world problems.

Problem-based learning aims to build a bridge between what happens
on campus and what occurs in real life, according to Dr. Terry
Goodin, an assistant professor in MTSU's Womack Family
Educational Leadership Department and a First Tuesday Series
presenter.

The new teaching approach is being used across the United States in
similar teacher-education redesign plans. The PBL approach
restructures the teaching process to make it a more meaningful,
practical experience for students rather than simply learning and
reciting facts. The process was first used in medical schools,
where students worked to understand and solve real patient cases
for class, and it continues to be a problem-based curriculum.

Problems are used to stimulate students' creativity and
initiate real-life applications. Students end up with higher levels
of comprehension, development of creativity and social skills,
Goodin said, adding that the process seems to reflect the way the
mind actually works.

In response to the growing interest in PBL, the Tennessee Board of
Regents has implemented a Teacher Education Redesign program, which
is being developed at East Tennessee State University, Tennessee
Tech, the University of Memphis, Tennessee State, Austin Peay and
MTSU. As a result, MTSU is working with these institutions, along
with Vanderbilt University and the University of Tennessee, to
discover the best PBL practices and applications.

MTSU is playing a leading role in the TBR's
education-redesign program through its Ready2Teach program,
formerly known as the Teaching Quality Initiative. The TQI pilot
program, launched in fall 2008, focused on using PBL to help
prepare future educators to meet the needs of 21st-century
learners. Ready2Teach emphasizes real-world learning activities and
offers an extended-residency program for prospective teachers at
the undergraduate level.

The First Tuesday three-session series involved approximately 45
participants who learned about the new teaching style, including a
practical application of PBL during the final session.

Goodin said the series received an enthusiastic response from the
attendees, and organizers plan to bring a guest speaker to campus
next spring to provide more information about PBL.

What changes can educators expect to see as a result of PBL
training over the next five years?

"I think a lot of our professors use PBL kind of
informally,"; Goodin said, "because what we try to do a
lot of times is link learning to practice and give students an
experience in doing something with the knowledge that they are
given through their course, which is the underlying premise of PBL.

"I wish … to formalize what we are doing informally, so
we can study it and find out what the best practices and best ways
of using PBL are at the college level.";

To discuss real-life situations in the classroom that are
encountered in the workplace is an incredible tool for both
teachers and students, he said, adding that colleges will be
sending candidates into the work force who will feel more prepared
because of their education, so why not start now?

Professionals seeking to gain an advantage in a tight labor market
can add another credential after their names with a new
interdisciplinary graduate certificate offered by MTSU's
Women's and Gender Studies Program.

"The 18-credit-hour program is an opportunity for
professionals in areas such as health care, education, legal and
social services and in the nonprofit sector to acquire expertise on
women's and gender issues that can help them advance in their
careers,"; says Dr. Newtona "Tina"; Johnson,
Women's and Gender Studies director.

Starting in spring 2011, students can gain advanced training in the
areas of feminist theory and methodologies and in-depth knowledge
of gender inequality, along with the intersection of gender and
other forms of social identity and positioning, such as race, age,
ability, religion, nationality, ethnicity, sexual orientation and
socioeconomic class.

"The program will expose students to new ways of thinking
about women and gender that interrogate and expand the processes by
which knowledge about human beings is acquired, interpreted and
transmitted,"; Johnson says. "Students will have the
opportunity to research these new ways of thinking and to apply the
knowledge to their personal and professional lives.";

The certificate can be a stand-alone credential for
non-degree-seeking students or an additional credential for
students who are enrolled in MTSU graduate-degree programs.

Core requirements constitute nine of the 18 credit hours to obtain
the certificate. They are Feminist Theory (WGST 6000), Feminist
Methods (WGST 6010) and either an internship (WGST 6020) or
Directed Reading and Research (WGST 6021).

"People who are already working professionals not aiming for
a graduate degree might prefer the internship, whereas students who
are thinking of an academic career might want to do more
research,"; says Johnson.

Nine hours of electives may be chosen from at least two different
departments that offer approved electives, including English,
history, psychology and sociology/anthropology. At least three
credit hours of electives must be taken at the 6000 level.

Electives must be 5000-, 6000-or 7000-level courses that meet WGST
criteria for course selection. They also must be approved by the
WGST curriculum committee, taught by graduate faculty and approved
by the graduate council.

For information, contact Johnson at 615-898-5910 or
womenstu@mtsu.edu or the College of Graduate Studies at
615-898-2840 or
graduate@mtsu.edu.

The MTSU Veterans Memorial Committee planted a tree to honor all
Vietnam-era veterans in a Nov. 13 ceremony near the memorial in
front of the Tom H. Jackson Building.

A flag paying tribute to prisoners of war and personnel listed as
missing in action was added to the new flagpole in an installation
ceremony conducted by Rolling Thunder.

The memorial is a bipartite black granite wall engraved with the
names of members of the MTSU community who have perished in the
service of the nation. It is a living memorial constructed in the
form of a plaza that can be used for classroom instruction, formal
ceremonies or private contemplation.

Brick pavers, many featuring the names of family members and other
loved ones who have served their country, are arrayed in rows
between the wall and the Jackson Building. Proceeds from the
ongoing sale of the pavers go into the memorial fund.

For more information about the Veterans Memorial or how to purchase
personalized brick pavers, contact Robyn Kilpatrick at 615-390-5675
or
rkilpatr@mtsu.edu.

HONORING THEIR SERVICE—Members of Rolling Thunder, above
left, a nonprofit organization that honors prisoners of war and
service members missing in action, install the POW/MIA flag at the
MTSU Veterans Memorial at a special ceremony on Nov. 13. Above,
MTSU Army ROTC cadets march in formation during the ceremony. They
are, from left, Sonia Dixson, Tommie Lane, Jayson Cantrell, Melvin
Taylor and Joshua Wilcox.

MTSU Blueraider #1 solved seven of nine problems in capturing first
place Nov. 6 in the competition at Tennessee Tech University in
Cookeville.

Team members include Matt Bradley and Michael Chasteen of Smyrna
and Nathan Reale of Franklin. All are computer-science majors.

The trio ranked eighth out of 142 teams in the entire mid-central
region, which includes Missouri, Arkansas, Illinois (and the
Greater Chicago metropolitan area), Indiana, Kentucky and
Tennessee, said Dr. Zhijiang Dong, the team's co-coach along
with Dr. Sung Yoo.

"I'm really excited about it,"; Chasteen wrote in
an e-mail about the team's accomplishment. "I believe
this is the first time MTSU has taken first place. I'm glad I
had the opportunity to represent the school and the computer
science department at this event.

"All the professors in the computer-science department are
wonderful instructors, and I owe my success to them. We have a
great program here.";

Of the nine problems, Chasteen said, "the degree of
difficulty ranged from trivial to advanced. The more challenging
problems required a lot of critical thinking, problem-solving
skills and advanced programming methods to solve.";

MTSU Blueraider #2 solved three problems and placed 17th overall
out of the 22-team field. Team members included computer-science
majors Anthony Mills of Murfreesboro, Chris Brasington of
Sevierville and Tom Richards of Germantown.

"We only have five hours to solve as many problems as we can,
as fast as we can,"; Chasteen said of the ACM contest.
"In school, we usually have a week or two to do one program.
We were able to solve seven of nine problems. We almost got the
eighth one solved, but we ran out of time.

"One of the reasons we won was because we split up the
problems amongst ourselves and solved them on our own. This enabled
us to rotate turns on the one computer we were allowed to use to
type up our solutions and submit them. After we got the easy
problems done, we started teaming up on the harder ones. And when
one of us had a problem getting a solution to work right, the rest
of the team would stop and help debug the code.";

"They all did a wonderful job,"; Dong said. "We
are extremely proud of how they performed. Only three teams in the
whole region solved more problems. We have never been so close to
the ACM-Intercollegiate Programming Contest World Finals.";

The news quickly spread throughout the department.

"We're excited,"; said Dr. Chrisila Pettey,
interim chairwoman for computer science. "This is the first
time in 20-plus years that we've won. We're competing
against Tennessee Tech, the University of Tennessee at Knoxville,
Belmont, East Tennessee State and others. Those are impressive
schools to be competing against.";

An MTSU mock-trial team placed second in its division and MTSU
students received the top number of individual awards at the
Mid-South Invitational Mock Trial Tournament held at MTSU Nov.
12-13.

Sixty-four teams from colleges and universities as far away as
California, Texas, Utah, Minnesota and Florida participated in the
four-round tournament, which, after 20 years, is one of the longest
continuously running invitational tournaments in the nation. In it,
teams of six to eight students argue each trial over roughly three
hours before two attorneys.

MTSU senior Rachel Harmon of Atlanta was named one of the
tournament's top attorneys. Senior Karen Lenoir of Antioch,
Tenn., freshman Megan McClarty of Smyrna, Nashville junior
Constance Grieves and freshman Lisa Starke of Euless, Texas, were
included in their division's top-10 witnesses.

Three MTSU mock-trial teams participated in the two-division event.

One MTSU team came in second overall with a record of 7-1 by
capturing two ballots against Bellarmine University, splitting
ballots with the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill,
gaining two ballots against Southern Methodist University and
winning both ballots against Rhodes College. The team included
students Harmon, Nathan Brown and Zac Barker as attorneys and
McClarty, Jordan Cassadine, Ashley Fuqua and Andrew Mitchell as
witnesses. Only the eight ballots won by the University of South
Carolina, which won both the division and the tournament, bested
their efforts.

A second MTSU team brought home a 5.5-2.5 record and included David
Haggard, Lee Whitwell and Samantha Farish as attorneys and Karen
Lenoir, Kristin Johnson, Lexi Sengupta, Kayla Crabtree and Ryan
Williams as witnesses. That group carried two ballots against
Georgia Tech, had a win and a tie with Rhodes College, lost two
ballots to North Alabama and won two ballots against a second team
from Georgia Tech.

MTSU's third mock-trial team included Grieves, Kaitlin Beck
and Heather Haggard serving as attorneys and Jessica Seitz, Mariane
Schiff, Lisa Starke and Andrew Dellinger serving as witnesses. That
team had a 5-3 record, winning both ballots against Fresno State
University and Georgia Tech, losing two ballots to Bob Jones
University and splitting ballots with the University of Alabama at
Birmingham.

The tournament is directed by Dr. John R. Vile, dean of
MTSU's University Honors College, in conjunction with fellow
coaches Brandi Snow, Shiva Bozarth and Kevin Rayburn, who are local
attorneys and MTSU mock-trial alumni, and Pam Davis, the
administrative assistant in the Department of Political Science.

WELL DONE—Members of MTSU's Mock Trial Team celebrate
their second-place finish at the Mid-South Invitational Tournament.

Dr. Judith Iriarte-Gross (chemistry, GRITS
Collaborative Project) attended the first National Girls
Collaborative Project Collaboration conference Oct. 20-22 in
Washington, D. C. She facilitated a session on "Encouraging
Parent Involvement in Girls' Science Learning";
presented by Dale McCreedy of The Franklin Institute. Iriarte-Gross
also was an invited panelist for the plenary session "Sharing
Strategies—Voices from the Collaboratives."; The GRITS
Collaborative Project also was highlighted at the Collaboration
Showcase during the conference.

Dr. Jason D. Johnson (mathematical sciences)
hosted the fourth annual Middle Tennessee New Mathematics Teacher
Conference at MTSU Oct. 9. The conference was designed to support
local new math teachers in grades six through 12.

Donations

Dr. Robert B. Blair (business communication and
entrepreneurship, Center for Economic Education) received a framed
international currency collection from Janice Bosman, president of
the International Society for Business Education, after her
retirement from teaching this summer. The collection is on display
in the Center for Economic Education library and includes currency
from Argentina, Aruba, Belgium, Canada, China, France, Germany,
Japan, Mexico, the Netherlands, the Philippines, Singapore, Sweden,
Trinidad/Tobago and the United Kingdom.

Events

Dr. Carroll Van West (Center for Historic
Preservation) served as co-chair of the Tennessee Civil War
Sesquicentennial Commission, which coordinated the Tennessee
sesquicentennial Nov. 12-13 in Nashville. Events included a
workshop on interpretation, special projects and exhibits sponsored
by the Tennessee State Library and Archives and the MTSU Center for
Historic Preservation.

Grants

Drs. Jette Halladay (theatre),
Tony V. Johnston (agribusiness),
Robert B. Blair (BCEN),
Stephen D. Morris (political science) and
Gerald Morton (concrete industry management)
received a $6,350 International Education Fee Funding
Opportunities/Faculty Development Through Education Abroad
Opportunities grant to fund an interdisciplinary exploratory trip
to Honduras to investigate international experiential/
service-learning program opportunities for MTSU students and
faculty. The project will begin in early 2011.

Lectures

Dr. Vic Montemayor (physics and astronomy)
delivered the closing plenary talk at a July 22-25 summer school,
organized by the American Association of Physicists in Medicine, at
the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia. The event discussed
methods of improving medical physics graduate programs and was
attended by about 120 faculty or program directors from four
continents.

Passages

Ms. Barbara Jean Albert (Facilities Services)
passed away Nov. 9. She is survived by her son, Irvin Albert, Jr.;
three daughters, Connie Anderson, Connie Landers and Tawana Albert;
and many other relatives and friends. Ms. Albert was employed by
MTSU from April 1996 until her retirement in March 2002.

Presentations

Drs. Hugh Berryman (anthropology, Forensic
Institute for Research and Education) and
John Haffner (horse science) presented
"Aerobic Decomposition for Large Scale Animal
Fatalities"; Oct. 6 at the Department of Homeland Security
Science and Technology Southeast Regional Research Initiative
Semi-Annual Projects Review Meeting in Washington, D.C. On Oct. 14,
Berryman presented "Thermal Trauma to Bone"; at the
National Advocacy Center in Columbia, S.C., for the National
District Attorneys Association.

Dr. Zachariah Sinkala (mathematical sciences)
presented "Computing the stochastic dynamics of multiscale
model of MAPK signaling cascade"; at the MEEG 2010
international Conference on Molecular Epidemiology and Evolutionary
Genetics of Infectious Diseases in Amsterdam, Netherlands Nov. 3-5.
He also chaired a symposium, "General mechanisms of
evolution,"; at the conference.

Dr. William F. Ford (Weatherford Chair of Finance)
published an article, "The World's Most Profitable
Company,"; in the November 2010
American Institute for Economic Research Bulletin.
Ford's article also was referenced in the Nov. 3 issue of
The Wall Street Journal.

Dr. Debra Rose Wilson (nursing) published a book
review on
The Culture of Teenage Mothers by J. Gregson in the
Journal of Health Care for the Poor and Underserved,
21(4), 1414-1415.

Workshops

Dr. Warren Anderson (agribusiness and agriscience)
discussed soil-structure problems arising from soil compaction at
the "Get Your Grass in Gear"; workshop presented by Knox
County Stormwater Management. He also helped the Rutherford County
Natural Resource Conservation Service host the countywide 4-H and
Future Farmers of America land-judging contest.

Get noticed in
The Record!

Submit Faculty/Staff Update items and other news to
gfann@mtsu.edu by 3 p.m. Wednesday, Dec. 1, for the final
fall 2010 edition of
The Record, Dec. 13. (Include items occurring between Dec.
13 through Jan. 16, 2011.) Submit news for the first 2011 edition
of
The Record (Jan. 17) by 3 p.m. Wednesday, Jan. 5, 2011.
Thanks for another great year!

Submit Campus Calendar items and other news to
gfann@mtsu.edu by 3 p.m. Wednesday, Dec. l, for the final
fall 2010 edition of
The Record, Dec. 13. (Include items occurring between Dec.
13 through Jan. 16, 2011.) Submit news for the first 2011 edition
of
The Record (Jan. 17) by 3 p.m. Wednesday, Jan. 5, 2011.
Thanks for another great year!